Description:
Rising sea level would destroy weak parts of the sand belt, which is essential for the protection of lagoons and the low-lying reclaimed lands in the Nile delta of Egypt (Mediterranean Sea). The impacts would be very serious: One third of Egypt's fish catches are made in the lagoons. Sea level rise would change the water quality and affect most fresh water fish. Valuable agricultural land would be inundated.

Main greenhouse gasesThe table lists some of the main greenhouse gases (such as carbon dioxide, methane, and freons) and their concentrations in pre-industrial times and in 1994; atmospheric lifetimes; anthropogenic sources; and Global Warmi...

By Philippe Rekacewicz, UNEP/GRID-Arendal

Temperature and CO2 concentration in the atmosphere over the past 400 000 yearsOver the last 400,000 years the Earth's climate has been unstable, with very significant temperature changes, going from a warm climate to an ice age in as rapidly as a few decades. These rapid changes suggest that clima...

By Philippe Rekacewicz, UNEP/GRID-Arendal

Sources of greenhouse gasesShows the sources for greenhouse gases, contributing to climate change, and their relative radiative forcing effect (radiative forcing is the change in the balance between radiation coming into the atmosphere and radiati...

By Philippe Rekacewicz, UNEP/GRID-Arendal

Radiative forcing - energy balances and the greenhouse effectRadiative forcing is the change in the balance between radiation coming into the atmosphere and radiation going out. A positive radiative forcing tends on average to warm the surface of the Earth, and negative forcing te...

By Philippe Rekacewicz, UNEP/GRID-Arendal

Thinning of the Arctic sea-iceSea-ice draft is the thickness of the part of the ice that is submerged under the sea. Comparison of sea-ice draft data acquired on submarine cruises between 1993 and 1997 with similar data acquired between 1958 and 1976...

By Philippe Rekacewicz, UNEP/GRID-Arendal

IPCC structureIn 1988, UNEP and WMO jointly established the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) as concern over changes in the climate became a political issue. The purpose of the IPCC was to assess the state of knowledge...

By Philippe Rekacewicz, UNEP/GRID-Arendal

Global atmospheric concentration of CO2Atmospheric CO2 has increased from a pre-industrial concentration of about 280 ppmv to about 367 ppmv at present (ppmv= parts per million by volume). CO2 concentration data from before 1958 are from ice core measurements...

By UNEP/GRID-Arendal

Potential climate change impactsIf greenhouse gas concentrations keep rising, climatic changes are likely to result. Those changes will potentially have wide-ranging effects on the environment and socio-economic and related sectors, such as health, agr...